Elkab, 1937-2007: seventy years of Belgian archaeological research

L. Limme

The site of Elkab (southern Upper Egypt) has been the subject of archaeological investigations by Belgian teams since 1937. Until the early 1980s fieldwork focused upon the exploration of several zones situated within the great town enclosure: the temple area, the prehistoric (epipalaeolithic) settlement, the Naqada III cemetery and the Graeco-Roman village. Since 1986, archaeological activities have shifted to the rock necropolis northeast of the town, in the mouth of Wadi Hilâl. A series of Old Kingdom (Sixth Dynasty) rock tombs, an unviolated New Kingdom tomb, a Third Dynasty mastaba and a Second Dynasty cemetery have been investigated. In recent years attention has also been paid to the epigraphic recording of the tomb of Setau, a high priest of Nekhbet during the Twentieth Dynasty.